Explanation of online and offline modes in Unidrive M Connect
Applies to V02.00.00 and later.
Overview
Unidrive-M Connect projects work in both offline and online modes.
In offline mode any data you are looking at or editing, such as parameters in a menu listing, will be the "project" values that are held on disk on your computer. For example, if you open up a listing for menu 5 you are looking at the values held in the project.
When you switch to online mode, Connect will now show you the values obtained directly from connected drive and any changes you make will be written to the online drive. For example, if you have menu 5 open, the menu 5 values on the connected drive will be displayed.
Switching from offline to online
Online mode is toggled by pressing this button on the drive's dashboard, or on the ribbon.
When you take a drive in a project online Connect first checks that the device configuration is as expected and will ask you to confirm any mismatches. If the differences are significant enough you may need to upload the configuration and parameter values from the drive (this will overwrite any offline data you have).
Once any mismatches have been resolved, Connect switches all views associated with that drive into online mode and they display data from the connected drive. Online views typically have a green border around then and a "Live" indicator.
Any changes you make to parameter values will be sent to the drive.
Switching from online to offline
When you go offline, any open views will switch to showing the project values again and not those of the previously connected drive, unless you edited some parameter values online in Connect - they will be copied from the online session back into the project. Parameter values edited by other means, e.g. the drive keypad, will not be copied to offline.
Why does Connect work this way?
With CTSoft (the commissioning software for Unidrive SP, Mentor MP, etc.), users reported that parameters could change unexpectedly when going online and offline. The reason for this is that when online CTSoft will write any monitored values into the project. For example, if the menu 5 listing is open in CTSoft when online, some menu 5 values from the drive may be written into the project. No values will be written for other menus unless their listings are opened as well.
To resolve potential confusion, Connect only overwrites project data if the user deliberately edits a parameter value (offline or online) or deliberately does a parameter upload. For new users of Connect this means they can go online and offline and not unexpectedly overwrite project data without making a deliberate choice to edit values or perform an upload.